Faulted

Have you ever just lain in bed, staring up at the ceiling, unable to sleep but too tired to move? That's the story of my life. My name is Crescendo Beatriz and I'm an insomniac. I have been for a long time.

They started when I was about thirteen, the sleepless nights. To this day I don't know what triggered them. I was a fairly typical, cheerful thirteen year old, albeit possibly a little more audacious and altruistic than most people my age. The first time it happened, I ignored it. I reasoned that it was probably a one-off occurrence and there was no point in concerning my poor mourning mother, who just lost her husband to cancer, about something as trivial as a sleepless night. Besides, it was probably just stress from schoolwork or something keeping me up at night anyway, I thought. And so I reasoned every night for the next two years.

Occasionally, I would get a few hours sleep, but not more than four and never more than three times a week. I begun to worry but still didn't tell my mother for fear of her delicate mental state worsening further.

By the time I was fourteen I was ripping myself apart. I didn't think I could tell my mother because maybe she was still in mourning. I mean, I didn't notice it that much but maybe a year wasn't enough to get over someone. On the other hand, the insomnia was slowly affecting other aspects of my life. I was more moody than ever, my usually clean complexion was splotchy and I had dark rings under my now-tired blue eyes that made me look fifty instead of fourteen.

My appetite was decreasing slowly and I wasn't as tall as I should have been. It was like my body was slowly but surely shutting down. I was almost definite that it wasn't solely the insomnia doing this to me but I couldn't quite think what else it could be. Maybe depression, I thought, or maybe something else. I never once guessed that my father's cancer might've been genetic or that I, of all people, may have the same problem. I still had the infamous teenage sense of immortality. No, it didn't even cross my mind. Even now, it is impalpable.

It wasn't until two days before my fifteenth birthday that I finally made up my mind to tell my mother. It was getting way too serious and I felt like I was dying. I knew it wasn't just a sleeping issue anymore. And besides, I reasoned, it had been almost two and a half years since my father died. Surely, I assumed, one would be over their lover in two years. Surely, no love could be so strong as to last that long without life. Looking back now, it is painfully obvious that I had no idea how strong my mother's love for my father was or how she still stayed up crying long after I had gone to bed. I didn't know how deep or powerful love could be. And that was both my mother's undoing and mine. Literally.